Come and Take It, 190 Years On: A Shut-Down Leviathan, Foreign Money in Texas Elections, and a Will Held Against Itself

Daniel Miller marked the 190th anniversary of the Battle of Gonzales by reminding viewers what “come and take it” was meant to be. A statement of defiance, not capitulation. The settlers who rode out over a cannon barely larger than a shotgun were contending for a principle, that government has no right to strip people of the means to defend themselves. His complaint was that too many of the officials now elected to represent Texas treat the same phrase as an open invitation, all but daring Washington and Austin to come take the money and the rights. The spirit has dwindled, he said, but it has not disappeared.

On the federal shutdown, Miller refused to celebrate. A half-shuttered government is still a leviathan Texas is tethered to, and when it dives, Texas goes down with it. He ran through the promises that evaporated since January, the income-tax abolition that vanished, the Epstein files that never came, border reform that exists only in the numbers and not on the ground, and warned that whatever precedent Trump set by targeting departments he calls Democrat will be used by the next AOC or Mamdani to lurch hard the other way. The pendulum has no brake at the federal level. The only way out, he repeated, is out.

The longest thread answered a recurring complaint, that Texas government is too incompetent and bloated to be trusted with independence. Miller’s answer was that the federal relationship is what enables the dysfunction. Out-of-state campaign money, he said, is a sovereignty issue and not a campaign-finance one. Money from California, New York, or K Street is as foreign as money from Canada or China, yet it pours in and helps decide who governs Texas, as James Talarico’s all-fifty-states haul shows. The career ladder from Austin to Washington bends officials like Greg Abbott toward a national audience, while the 24-hour federal circus swallows the attention that would otherwise catch state politicians lying about property taxes and phantom income-tax bans. Two layers of tyranny, he argued, and the one worth shedding is the one Texans have the least say in.

Questions answered in this episode

• Given the federal shutdown, is real shrinkage of the government possible, or will the next swing back to the left simply undo any of it?
• The incompetence and bloat of Texas government makes me distrust Austin as much as Washington. Why hand them the future of Texas?
• When can the TNM figure out how to remove the cancer in Austin so Texas can prosper, and is the order of operations right?
• Are y’all still holding meetings in Decatur, and how does someone who has never attended find a local one?
• Have you seen the TEXIT coin out of McKinney, and is it affiliated with the movement?
• Glenn Beck hosted Alberta’s freedom movement. Could the TNM get coverage on his show?
• You always say coffee talk is your break from working on TEXIT. So what does the rest of your day actually look like?
• Are we near the inflection point where mainstream Texas Republicans realize independence is the only viable path forward?